At a small gathering where Karen and I were asked to lead singing, the Holy Spirit began to move through Karen and another woman in a beautiful spontaneous spiritual song. Paul wrote about spiritual songs in Ephesians 5:19. While they were yet singing, a man stood up and began to shout out a prayer of thanks for a Christian politician who had recently been elected. Oblivious to the Spirit’s moving, the man continued to pray over the top of the singers who began to heave as the Spirit song given through them, was interrupted. Had the man not read Paul who wrote to the Ephesians and Thessalonians:

Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God and Do not quench the Spirit.

What beautiful message might the Holy Spirit have had for our gathering, had the man not run off the Holy Spirit by his selfish and long-winded prayer?